blogger interrupted

A blogger who gets interrupted as much as I have gets asked a lot of questions. Like…what happened? It’s the same story every time for me, with graded variations. But with Buckeye State Blog, I think I owe at least Jerid an explanation. Maybe his readers want to know, too.

After a long self-imposed moratorium, I started blogging at BSB regularly during the OH-05 special election last fall. I got back into the groove, and then offered to help Jerid during his finals, which in law school, last almost a month. One of the few things that make me happy anymore is being needed by a friend, and delivering for them. After a while, I was back, for real. So I stuck around through the March 4 primary, which really got me in a groove again.

But when the primary “ended”, Jerid suddenly wanted to step away from the Obama-Clinton discussion. The argument was basically, hey, the primary’s over, Hillary won Ohio. Jerid never explicitly told me to stop writing about the presidential, just to limit the posting, tone it down a bit, and focus more down ballot. I’m not divulging any big confidence here, it’s plain in Jerid’s posting and that of others.

Now, I don’t mind being edited, but I do mind being edited by the Ohio Democratic Party. It is absolutely clear to me that the line Jerid was giving me was the line ODP was giving him. And given that ODP Chair Chris Redfern isn’t above making threats, I don’t blame Jerid for one minute if he wanted to pass that line along.

Jerid is a student, who will leave law school with a mountain of debt and need a job, who also happens to have placed himself at the very top of political discourse in Ohio. If he wants his blog to be less of a problem for him personally because some puke at ODP is sending him emails, I get that.

It also became clear to me that my own particular brand of Russo Drama was starting to creep into my relationship with BSB. I’m not gonna get into that now, may later, and as you can probably guess from my About page, I don’t ever plan to pull another punch again. But the bottom line is that if Chris Redfern isn’t afraid to threaten Jerid Kurtz’s career to his face on camera, I can only imagine what Redfern, his buddies, sycophants, and paid lackeys, are happy to do behind the scenes.

So I thought about what I was doing at BSB, had some off-the-record discussions with a few folks, sent a few emails, and what become abundantly clear was that I needed to leave BSB, both for me, and for Jerid. Make of it what you will, but I know a friend when I see one, and Jerid is a friend. If I am sick to death of Russo Drama, it must nauseate my friends, too. And I do not want yet another relationship, with yet another friend, to be completely destroyed because of whatever sick game some asshole, tenured at my law school alma mater or otherwise, decides to play with my life and those around me. Homey don’t play that no more.

So back to what I was saying before I was so rudely…interrupted. ODP’s post-primary effort to pretend Ohio is over is laughable on its face. Every uncommitted superdelegate in Ohio is worth more to Ted Strickland and Hillary Clinton than the combined votes of over 2 million Ohio Democrats, and they are making damned sure of it. Just ask Bill Clinton, who I’m sure had so many better things to do in California (because California is so “over”, too) than to launch a red-faced tirade at a room with fewer uncommitted superdelegates in it than there are in Ohio.

Word is, from many sources, (including myself, having been on the receiving end of it on a blog LMAO) that Ted Strickland has played the same hardball with superdelegates since March 4. And as sure as the sun coming up tomorrow, he will continue, until Hillary’s candidacy is no longer The Undead but the real thing. Ted’s operation spares no effort threatening and cajoling every Ohio superdelegate with a combination of carrots and sticks only the office of the governor can deliver. (note to Fernsy…people do still talk to me, and if a union-scale reporter wants to use his full time job to document this, there might be a…..ahem….Pulitzer in it for ‘em.)

If Ted Strickland cares enough about the content of BSB, to have Chris Redfern send a flunky to reach down into its editorial, and try to manage that narrative, just think what message, among other things, he’s sending to, oh, say, Enid Goubeaux. I’m sure Bill Burga endorsed Hillary out of the kindness of his heart, too. Sure, the primary is over…give me a fucking break.

So welcome to my new blog! If this one gets interrupted too, it will be me who does the interrupting, on my terms. Not Chris Redfern, not the Plain Dealer’s Jean Dubail or Mark Naymik, not Sherrod Brown, nor his petty blog-obsessed wife, not Phil DeVellis not WCPN, not Meet The Fucking Bloggers. I’m planning on sticking around for a very long time…at least planning to.

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